


take me all the way

by moodmaker



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Friends to Lovers, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-12
Packaged: 2021-03-14 13:35:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29792703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moodmaker/pseuds/moodmaker
Summary: Summer before junior year, Jisung does three things:1) He procrastinates on his summer homework,2) Nearly dies in the passenger seat of a Toyota Camry, and3) Falls in love with his best friend.Fortunately, he doesn’t regret any of them.
Relationships: Park Jisung/Zhong Chen Le
Comments: 10
Kudos: 67





	take me all the way

**Author's Note:**

  * For [strayion](https://archiveofourown.org/users/strayion/gifts).
  * Inspired by [i wanna cut to the feeling](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17812625) by [orphan_account](https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account). 



> cindy—i'm sure you had absolutely no idea that out of everything you've written i'd choose to remix this. completely unexpected. who would've thought? in all seriousness thank you for the honor of doing so; i'm sorry to be so late but i hope you enjoy and that this does the original even a fraction of justice <3
> 
> set in america, title from cut to the feeling - carly rae jepsen, written for crysmas ficmix, accompanying playlist [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0AE0aYP9peN4ZehBXOW4um?si=tn5zmyB7T3Sd3yh7foyP6w)

Jisung’s not a fully-devout, capital letter Believer like Mark is, who goes to church every Sunday and only falls asleep half the time (“He’s actually a Belieber,” Donghyuck snickers to him during lunch when he thinks Mark isn’t listening. Except Mark is, and he thwacks Donghyuck over the head with his JB-merchandised notebook to prove it), but Jisung does believe in some things. His mom’s seaweed soup, for one. Snow days, post-run serotonin, the power of all that is great and merciful whenever he has a test the next day that he knows he hasn’t studied enough for. Love. Soulmates, too.

“Really?” Chenle had scrunched his face up in distaste when Jisung told him so. “I’ve never thought about it. Like,” he shudders as he points to their parents sitting at the dining table, chatting over tea and sunflower seeds. “Can you imagine that with them?”

As a matter of fact Jisung could, because his dad is still the kind of sap that likes to come home with flowers sometimes, special occasion or not. Chenle might be a firm believer that parents were best when they didn’t exist outside of being parents and therefore all permutations of love should be spoon-fed from Hollywood and the like, but Jisung secretly thought it was kind of sweet. Some people believed their love was so strong that it couldn’t have come just from them alone. Jisung wants to be one of them.

Maybe there isn’t a string tied around their pinky connecting them to their other half, but he likes to think that fate had a hand in his life somehow. Because how else do you explain the fact that the only empty seat on the first day of fifth grade had been next to Chenle, that his parents had taken one look at the two of them and sighed, “We better put the hospital on speed dial,” that Jisung crushes hard and fast but only seriously falls in love, like really, in _love,_ with the only person it could’ve ever been all along?

It’s not a very earth-shattering realization, or even much of a realization. The summer before junior year Chenle gets his permit and proceeds to drive exactly like how all insurance companies think teenagers drive. In the passenger seat Jisung squeezes his eyes shut at each speed limit broken and thinks, consolingly, _well at least we’ll die together,_ and only learns later from Jaemin that that is not a normal thought to have on the brink of death.

“Why would you even get into his car?” Jaemin asks, swinging their basket back and forth. They’re at the mall doing back-to-school shopping, because Jaemin had insisted and Chenle was too busy hosting family friends to get Jisung out of it. “That’s a suicide mission right there.”

So Jisung’s not normal. Okay. Big deal—most high schoolers aren’t.

“No,” Jaemin stresses, forehead pinched. “Your thoughts about _Chenle_ aren’t normal.”

Jisung still doesn’t really get it, but sure, whatever. Jaemin took AP Psych last year and now believes he has complete and total understanding of every single interpersonal relationship that has ever existed, never mind that he can’t even figure out most of his own.

He opens his mouth to say so but gets cut off by his phone. The obnoxious vibration pattern Chenle had insisted on setting for himself makes it rattle so hard that it almost falls out of his pocket. Jisung considers ignoring it altogether, but Chenle would probably ignore him back for twice as long in retaliation. Or at least until Jisung bought him enough Doritos to make up for it.

Jaemin gives him a sideways look, knowing. “Aren’t you going to get that?”

Jisung answers it on the second ring. He tells himself it’s because he doesn’t have that kind of money.

“Save me,” comes Chenle’s voice on the other side of the line.

A smile starts tugging at the side of his mouth. “From what?”

“Yuta and Sicheng. I thought I was happy for them, and then I actually saw them together.” Chenle retches overdramatically into the receiver, and not for the first time Jisung wonders _why, why did I choose this one._

“What are they doing?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“Because that’s not ominous, or anything.”

Silence falls then, but Jisung knows Chenle well enough to be able to fill in the blanks. _You won’t be that obnoxious if you ever date someone, right?_

(Jisung makes no promises. Then again, the only person that he would ever even consider dating—not that he’s going to—is asking, so maybe he needs to reconsider.)

“Anyway,” Chenle continues, picking up the thread of conversation with all the grace of a camp icebreaker. “Did you do the summer work?”

“For which class?” Their teachers had suddenly decided that summer was no longer about video games and barely-legal driving and horrific sleep schedules, but SAT prep books and AP tests and college visits. Half of Jisung’s desk is buried under all the “review” sets he has to do for his classes once the school year starts. The other half is hidden by a pile of college brochures.

“I don’t know, all of them.” Chenle sighs on the other end, loud and petulant. “I told myself I was going to finish everything in June.”

“And then you didn’t.”

“And then I didn’t.”

“It’s okay,” Jisung says, even though they both know that it is very much not okay. “I haven’t started either. Now you won’t be the only one with an incomplete on your transcript.”

“I don’t think that bodes very well for our futures, Jisung.”

“I don’t think anything we do ever could,” he replies drily.

Chenle laughs at that, full-bodied. Even through the phone Jisung can hear Chenle’s mom shushing him afterward. Mollified, Chenle asks, “If I do the odd problems will you do the evens?”

“I thought that was a given?”

“Of course. I don’t know why I even asked.”

“Of course,” Jisung echoes.

They wind up pulling an all-nighter to make it work: they start FaceTiming at eight and spend the next ten hours listening to the scritch-scratch of their pencils in almost-silence, getting interrupted by Jisung accidentally disconnecting their call halfway through trading answers at two and Chenle slumping forward onto his desk every half hour to bemoan the events of his life that led him up to that point, but they make do. When the sun dawns the next day all their summer work is done. Their report cards are pristine for now.

Their lunch table, on the other hand, isn’t.

“What are you doing?” Jisung asks, a little concerned about sitting down at the sight in front of him. Their lunch tables are round, so for everyone to fit they have to cluster their trays around the edges and leave an approximately hexagonal expanse of table space in the middle. Usually, they’re perfectly content to leave that space alone. Today, they’ve decided to fill it with three rapidly growing piles of salt. 

Jaemin pauses from where he’d been furiously shaking to beam up at him. “Hi Jisung.”

“Hi,” he says back, a little suspiciously. To his left Chenle tilts his head and looks back and forth between the two of them. Weird.

“We need fifty grams of salt for our chem project,” Jeno informs him, when they’ve managed to shuffle themselves around so that Jisung has room to set his tray down. “Jaemin was supposed to bring it but he forgot, and class is next period. These shakers won’t open so we’re doing it the hard way.”

Jisung stares at him. “Can’t you ask around, or something?”

“No one else needed salt for their project,” Donghyuck huffs, three shakers grasped in each hand as he pounds them against the table.

“This is why you shouldn’t take chem,” Renjun says then, pulling his chopsticks out of the travel bag that he’d hand-sewn for them. He sniffs, self-righteous. “Physics is way better.”

“No it’s not,” Chenle scowls. “I’m dying and we’ve only just started. I thought we’d get to throw things around or something, not actually have to do math.”

“Physics math is easy,” Jisung points out.

“You want to do it for me then?”

No thanks. Jisung’s taking regular for a reason. He tells Chenle as such, who makes a noise of distaste but accepts it anyway.

“If it makes you feel any better I’m not doing too hot in there either,” he offers.

“Why would that make me feel better—I don’t want you to _fail,_ ” Chenle grumbles, head cushioned by his arms. “You make me sound so mean.”

“That’s because you are.”

“Love you too,” Chenle simpers. 

Jisung’s heart swoops down to his gut.

 _Breathe,_ he thinks.

“You two are gross,” Renjun informs them before Jisung can try to formulate a response, delicately popping a California roll into his mouth.

Donghyuck looks up from the salt piles. “Oh, you wanna see gross?”

“No, no I absolutely do not want to. Donghyuck, what do you think you’re doing—”

Too late. The salt has already exploded into the air. Their lunchroom looks like it’s been hit by the equivalent of a small blizzard. Everyone’s turned around to stare at their table, including three of the hall monitors near the door. One of them already has the detention slips out. The other two are reaching into their pockets to get them out.

“We needed that for our project!” Jaemin whines.

“Sorry,” Donghyuck says, not sounding very sorry at all.

Jisung stays in his seat and tries not to laugh, because that would definitely have adverse effects on Jaemin’s future willingness to give him rides. Across from him, Chenle is dragging a finger through the mess left on the table. Some of the salt has settled into the whorl of his hair, which should be disgusting but instead just makes him look like he’s been out in the snow. If Jisung stretched he could probably help brush it off.

Chenle brings his finger to his mouth.

“Oh, come on. It’s salt,” Jisung groans. “You already know what that tastes like.”

Chenle shoots him a grin, tongue poking out of the side of his mouth, and licks his finger.

 _Gross,_ Jisung thinks fondly.

Over the summer, Jeno started picking up extra shifts at the mall Starbucks. This means, most notably, that a) Jeno is their richest friend and therefore they are all entitled to bumming gas money off of him whenever they need to, and b) Chenle and Jisung have at least one more excuse to hang around the mall all day.

In a town like theirs that’s about the only thing you can do to pass the time. It helps that theirs is the nicest one in the area—the guy who’d owned it before had grand dreams of setting up an elaborate country club with a golf course and all, but failed to realize that he was probably the only person around who could afford to go to a place like that. The whole venture collapsed in less than a year.

What that means for them though, is that years later when Chenle inevitably gets tired of window shopping (read: trying out all the free samples and never actually buying anything, because their allowance only goes so far and everything’s cheaper on Amazon anyway) and needs a place to sit so that he can properly dissolve on the spot, there will be a stretch of not-so-carefully maintained golfing lawn in the middle of the food court for him to sprawl out onto.

Chenle props his head up on his heads, eyes scanning the storefronts closest to them. “I think we’re running out of places to terrorize.”

Jisung flops down onto the lawn next to him. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“It is. I can’t believe Jeno banned us from Starbucks. What’s the point of him working there if he won’t give us his employee discount?”

“To make money?”

“Capitalism,” Chenle sighs. “It gets everyone in the end.”

Jisung frowns. “You want to go into business.”

“That’s different. I’m going into money to make money, so that I can then—oh.”

“See? Same thing.”

“No,” Chenle says, shaking his head. “That can’t be right.”

“Well, you know what they say. You are what you eat.”

Chenle makes a face. “That is not what they say.”

“You become… what you fear?”

“Now you’re just making things up.”

“I don’t think I’m cut out for philosophy,” Jisung sighs, stretching himself out beside Chenle.

“Good choice. I don’t think that’s worked out for anyone since, like, Ancient Greece.”

He turns his head to the side and watches as Chenle picks at the lawn, fingers making quick work of the grass at his side. Someone’s bound to notice eventually and give them a warning about public property damage, just like they have every other time that Chenle’s picked at the lawn, but no one cares enough to do anything beyond that. Sometimes Jisung wonders, out of pure curiosity, how different his life would be if he’d grown up somewhere else; if he didn’t waste his days away in half-decent malls, or driving around aimlessly with the AUX barely functioning, or hanging around the same people day in and day out. Maybe there’s something better out there. Maybe there’s more to being a teenager than just school, the mall, and Chenle’s house.

Still, Jisung likes what he has right now.

So yeah—Chenle.

Jisung doesn’t know if he can call it a crush even though all the symptoms are there (butterflies, loss of focus, heart permanently converting into a megaphone for his thoughts whenever Chenle’s around, the works), because this has always been happening. He walked into the first day of fifth grade, saw Chenle smile when he dropped into the seat next to him, and his heart immediately sank in his chest. Not in a bad way—more like a stone settling at the bottom of a pond. Returning to its natural state of being. As if it was always meant to be there, and just needed a push.

Because Chenle is kind when it counts and teasing when it doesn’t, and Jisung never knew how much he liked that until one day during English Chenle interrupts their class discussion to point out Jisung’s raised hand. He’d been in the process of lowering it because he’d figured no one else had seen. It’s a small thing, but it matters: Chenle is always looking out for him, and Jisung is too in return. That’s the way that they are. That’s the way that they’ve always been. And it’s only now, after Jaemin’s pointed it out, that Jisung starts to realize that he’s not like this with any of his other friends.

After he’d finished speaking Chenle had reached over to squeeze his hand. Jisung visibly suppressed the full-body shiver that went through him in response.

 _You good?_ Chenle mouthed when their teacher wasn’t looking.

Jisung wasn’t, but he couldn’t exactly say that. He settled instead for staring at their linked hands and flashing Chenle a weak smile in response.

Except it probably starts even earlier than that.

He’s not dumb, despite what Renjun might think. The problem has never been about recognizing his feelings—it’s about what to _do_ with them. Jisung thinks about confessing and feels like someone is physically reaching inside his body to rearrange his guts. Absolutely not.

So, of course, he does the next best thing: edge all conversation into crush-related territory just enough to get advice, but never enough to incriminate himself.

(It’s a fine line to walk. Jisung’s pretty good at it though, if the looks that everyone gives him are any indication.)

Unfortunately no one else seems to find this topic as fascinating as he does, which would be true of most things that he says if it weren’t for Chenle. Except he can’t talk about Chenle _to_ Chenle—that’s a conflict of interest. Plus, Chenle would probably say something delightfully arrogant in response like, _well of course you fell for me, _and Jisung would probably blush instead of rightfully hitting him on the shoulder in retaliation. God. What is _wrong_ with him?__

____

____

“Nothing’s wrong with you,” Jaemin chides, carefully maneuvering himself onto the couch so that he doesn’t jostle Jeno’s head on his lap. He’d made an effort to explain what Jeno was doing here when Jisung first came over and asked for help, but Jisung has long since given up on trying to understand their… friendship? Relationship? Freak mutual codependency?

He still makes sure to nod at Jeno in acknowledgement, though. He was raised with manners.

“Really,” Jaemin smiles, clearly going for placating but instead looking mildly disturbed. “It’s very normal for you to feel this way.”

“I don’t need you to go all Dr. Phil on me,” Jisung scowls, slumping onto the couch. “I just want this to go away.”

“No you don’t.”

He sighs. “No I don’t."

“Here,” Jaemin rifles through his bag and emerges with a crinkled bubble tea receipt, which he flips over onto the coffee table. “You should write it down.”

“Write what down?”

“This,” Jaemin says, reaching for a pen.

_AN ITEMIZED LIST OF EVERY SINGLE TIME ZHONG CHENLE MADE PARK JISUNG’S HEART FLUTTER:_

Jisung snatches the pen out of Jaemin’s hand, cheeks warm. “That does _not_ happen.”

“It does too!”

He goes to make a few adjustments.

_AN ITEMIZED LIST OF EVERY SINGLE TIME ZHONG CHENLE MADE PARK JISUNG ~~’S HEART FLUTTER~~ WANT TO PUKE HIS GUTS OUT:_

> 1\. the first time i saw him, i guess. ~~wow, that’s romantic—~~ it was my first day at a new school. of course i felt like throwing up.  
>    
>  2\. when the world was supposed to end in 2012, because shouldn’t he have better priorities than trying to beat rainbow road before life as we knew it was going to end???? this is why we would never work out ~~jisung you were at his house playing mario kart right next to him~~ like practically speaking ~~you have never been practical before in your life~~ i should crush on someone with more common sense, right?  
>    
>  3\. didn’t he date someone he met online in freshman year… ~~that barely lasted two weeks~~ the guy was from australia! what was he thinking! ~~that you were never going to make a move, so he might as well?~~ i didn’t like anyone in freshman year. ~~hey didn’t you have a crush on me at first~~ I SAID I DIDN’T LIKE ANYONE IN FRESHMAN YEAR.  
>    
>  4\. does it count if it was secondhand? because i definitely thought i was going to throw up when he started doing musical. ~~what, were you nervous for him?~~ jaemin our school is huge! that’s a lot of people to make a fool out of yourself in front of. ~~you have such little faith in him.~~ that’s not true—i brought flowers because i knew he’d do well anyway. ~~and that’s the only reason?~~ obviously.  
>    
>  5\. you know that quiz they send out to everyone on valentine’s day… ~~didn’t you guys wind up as most compatible with each other?~~ wait, how do you know about that? ~~you called me afterward to make fun of it, because you said there was no way it could be reliable when it thought that you and chenle should date each other.~~ well.  
>    
>  6\. driver’s ed. no explanation needed. ~~yeah, i’ll give you that one.~~  
>    
>  7\. so, i might’ve told him that i liked someone this past summer. ~~YOU DID? wow, i never thought you had it in you.~~ i might’ve not told him who it was… ~~yeah, that sounds more like it. you know he’s not going to let go of that too easily.~~ i know. i’ll deal with that when it comes.  
>    
>  8\. i don’t know how he stays so calm during musical because i totally freaked when he came to our swim meet ~~have you maybe considered—~~ though to be fair, it’s so dark out that he probably can’t see me. so that’s probably why. ~~i don’t know why i even try.~~  
>    
>  9\. you know those little paper stars that you used to make in art class? he said that when you like someone, you’re supposed to fill up a jar and give it to them when you confess. ~~jisung, you suck at arts and crafts~~. well, it was a nice thought. ~~and it will stay just a thought.~~  
>    
>  10\. right now. and he’s not even HERE.

Jisung groans. “This isn’t even every single time.”

“Well of course not,” Jaemin says. “That would just be an autobiography.”

“Hey!”

“He’s not wrong,” Jeno chimes in.

__Jaemin smiles at him in response, to which Jisung clears his throat and looks away. He wishes Chenle were here, if only so that he wasn't stuck alone with Jeno and his barnacle._ _

__Eventually he walks back home with the list crinkled in his pocket. Truthfully, it doesn’t even matter when it happened—the point is that it already has._ _

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__Jisung’s never been a good gift-giver, mainly because he doesn’t ever give gifts. This isn’t usually a problem (“Why are we even friends?” Donghyuck will sigh whenever the topic comes up, melodramatic, and then ruffle Jisung’s hair all the same), but Chenle’s birthday is in two weeks and, well, that’s different._ _

__“Just get him a gift card,” Jaemin shrugs, on their way to the main gates. “It’s not like he’ll know the difference.”_ _

__That is a total lie. Chenle is nothing but perceptive when it comes to things that he shouldn’t be perceptive about._ _

__When the only answer Jaemin gets is a sigh, he starts to grin, wide. “Oh, I get it now.”_ _

__“No you don’t,” Jisung retorts automatically._ _

__“You don’t have to act so embarrassed. This is what people do when they like someon—”_ _

__Jisung claps his hands over his ears._ _

__“So you can deny it all you want but I’ll still know!”_ _

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__Thankfully, Mark has a slightly better idea of what to do._ _

__“Why don’t you write a song?”_ _

__Jisung frowns. “Isn’t that a little too much?”_ _

__“What do you mean?”_ _

__“Like,” he starts, scratching at the back of his neck. “Friends don’t really write songs for each other.”_ _

__Mark squints through the blue light of Jisung’s computer screen. “That’s not necessarily true.”_ _

__“Yeah, but it’s like it’ll…” he trails off, staring blankly at the corner of his bedpost. “It’ll mean something.”_ _

__“And you don’t want it to?”_ _

__“I don’t want to make things weird.”_ _

__Mark looks at him for a moment without saying anything, eyes soft. Jisung squirms in his seat and glances away._ _

__“If it’s any consolation, I don’t think you will,” Mark says eventually. “And I’ll help you, of course.”_ _

__Jisung stays silent, toying with the idea in his mind. It’s not like he’s got anything better—curse junior year and hellish workloads. He can’t even remember the last time he’d gotten more than four hours of sleep._ _

__He sighs. “I don’t know the first thing about writing lyrics.”_ _

__“You’re a writer,” Mark says, like that’s all there is to it. “And it’s Chenle. You’ve got this.”_ _

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__As it turns out, Mark was right—it really wasn’t as difficult as he had thought it would be. After Mark sent over the backing track for him to listen to, the words just fell into place from there. It’s not quite like writing a story, nor is it like writing poetry—the closest that Jisung can get to describing it is transcribing _feeling._ And he’s got no shortage of those, so it only takes them a couple of days to finish everything._ _

__“Oh my god,” Chenle says when he tells him. “You guys wrote me a song?”_ _

__“Don’t expect too much, it isn’t really your style.” Jisung’s been force-fed too much bubblegum pop to not know that. Which, now that he thinks about it, is kind of bad. Maybe he should’ve written a pop song. Oh god._ _

__His hand shakes as he goes to send the file. “Here,” he says, tapping at his phone. “Check your inbox.”_ _

__And then there’s nothing to do but wait. Now that Chenle’s actually listening to it, Jisung’s starting to see the downsides of gifting a song: for one, it’s awkward as hell to sit and wait for Chenle’s reaction, and hearing the words he’d penned so carefully come out so muted through Chenle’s ancient speaker just makes them sound dumb. He’s about to say something to try and make it better, somehow, but Chenle beats him to it._ _

__“How long did this take you?”_ _

__There’s a weird look in his eye, one that seems to cut Jisung down to the bone. Chenle has always had a pretty intimidating gaze, but this feels different, somehow. Like the intent behind it matters._ _

__“Don’t give me too much credit, I just came up with the lyrics,” Jisung says. Chenle’s still staring at him a little too seriously to be anything but genuine, so he follows that up with, “And like, I mostly thought of giving you a song because I’m broke.”_ _

__Whatever weird tension that’d been in the air before is instantly broken. Chenle throws a couch cushion at him and says, “Has anyone told you that you’re an asshole?”_ _

__Jisung dodges at the last second. “Just you.”_ _

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__School as a whole is mildly bearable at best and total hell any other time, but the weeks between Thanksgiving and winter break are especially horrible. Finals season comes and takes no prisoners; Jisung wishes on everything he can get his hands on—shooting stars, fallen eyelashes, four leaf clovers—and yet he’s still stuck staring blankly at every exam that he takes. It gets so bad that he wears down all the erasers on the ends of his pencils. By the time his last final rolls around, he winds up losing an entire page on his physics open response to a myriad of angry, crossed out lines. No matter—it’s not like he actually knew what he was writing._ _

Winter break is somehow even more eventful than finals season, given that Jisung’s family goes back to Korea for the first time in five years. His mom is determined to visit every single friend she has ever had in her entire life over the two weeks she’s in town, so he forcibly tags along to reunion after reunion after reunion. Which sucks, because his Korean is rusty and he can only make it through fifteen minutes of conversation, maybe, before his fluent facade starts falling apart and he gets banished to the kids corner. None of them want to be there, which is enough common ground for them to form an uneasy friendship based only on games of Angry Birds and Piano Tiles. There’s one girl among them who actually managed to finish all of Korean school—Jisung didn’t even know that you could _do_ that—so they put her in charge of talking to the waiter, and between all of them they manage to get the message across. Food is a universal language, after all.

__Chenle says that it can’t be any worse than his own winter break, which consists of lying around and eating copious amounts of junk food. A totally ideal way to waste away two weeks, in Jisung’s opinion._ _

__He doesn’t get a chance to tell Chenle this until they call for New Year’s though. Usually they celebrate it together at his house with the sparklers and all, but since he’s in Korea this year they’d had to compromise by arranging to call at the halfway point of their time difference. (“I can’t believe you’re making me do math for this,” Chenle had grumbled, and yet when Jisung proposed that they drop the call altogether Chenle had glared so viciously at him that Jisung felt guilty for even suggesting it)._ _

__He gets up early in the morning and waits groggily for the call to come through. His grandma’s house barely gets any wifi, so when Chenle finally pops up on the screen he’s pixelated to hell and back._ _

__“Can you see me?” Chenle asks, waving a hand back and forth._ _

__Jisung shakes his head, before he realizes that if he can’t see Chenle, then Chenle probably can’t see him either. “No,” he says, keeping his voice low in case he wakes anyone else. “But that’s probably a good thing. I don’t know if I want to see your face first thing in the morning.”_ _

__“You wish you could be so lucky,” is Chenle’s retort. They stare each other down for all of three seconds before breaking out into grins. Jisung’s dad snores loudly in the background, as if in reprimand._ _

__“I still think I got the short end of the stick,” Jisung says, glancing at the clock. “I had to get up at seven-thirty for this.”_ _

__“Weak,” Chenle scoffs, and then to soften the blow, “Happy New Year’s.”_ _

__“Happy New Year’s too.”_ _

__“I don’t think it’s New Year’s in any place right now except some spot in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.”_ _

__“Well, Happy New Year’s to the dolphins and fishes there, I guess.” Jisung’s brain falters for a second, as if trying to ask him where he’s going with this. “Hold out to climate change—we’re slowly banning plastic straws for you.”_ _

__Yeah, he has no clue either._ _

__“You know what we should’ve done?” Chenle asks, thankfully overlooking his brief flirtation with their global environmental crisis. “We should’ve just called two times. One for your midnight and one for mine.”_ _

__“Oh you’re right,” Jisung groans. “We’re so dumb.”_ _

__They sit with that for a moment, as if to let the full extent of their stupidity sink in._ _

__“Well,” Chenle shrugs. “We’re already here. How’s Korea?”_ _

__“The food’s really good.” Jisung frowns, considering. “Maybe too good. Did you know that the first thing my grandma said when she saw me again was that I’d gained weight? What does she think happens when people grow?”_ _

__“That’s just how grandmas are.”_ _

__“Yeah,” Jisung says. “I know.”_ _

__Chenle starts recounting one of his dreams then, something about angry gods and a party at the bottom of the sea, but Jisung’s long since tuned him out. In seven hours it’ll be Chenle’s midnight. Jisung will be stuck at a New Year’s gathering with relatives that he’s seen maybe once when he was six and subjected to a full-on interrogation accordingly, but he’ll be able to get away for a bit. Enough to wish Chenle Happy New Year’s for real this time._ _

__He sets an alarm for himself so that he doesn’t forget and tunes back into the dream. Now there are demonic octopuses involved?_ _

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__He crashes hard once he gets back. Jetlag consumes him and pries away any chance he has at establishing a regular sleep schedule, which, ironically enough, was his New Year’s resolution._ _

__“Why are you trying to drag me down with you,” Chenle huffs when Jisung calls him in the middle of the night after he’d run out of things to do. His voice is soft with sleep but harrowed all the same. “Just because you’re suffering doesn’t mean that I have to too.”_ _

__“Did you know that someone carved their initials into the corner of the ceiling above my dresser?”_ _

__A sigh. “Now I do.”_ _

__“What do you think E.M.W. stands for?”_ _

__“Eat my… wastewater.”_ _

__Jisung wrinkles his nose. “Really?”_ _

__“It’s five in the morning,” Chenle groans. “Excuse me if I’m not at my best.”_ _

__There’s a moment of quiet; Jisung slips off into wondering what E.M.W. liked so much about this room to carve their initials into it. It’s got one of those ugly popcorn ceilings. Not exactly a dream in real estate._ _

__He’s about to say so, but it occurs to him then that this probably isn’t the kind of thing Chenle wants to hear so early in the morning. In fact, he probably doesn’t want to hear anything at all, breaths coming out in even puffs on the other end of the line. Jisung can see it vividly: Chenle’s phone thrown haphazardly beside his pillow, sustained by the power bank that he’d swiped from Jisung the last time he came over. He’d be splayed out on his front, head pressing down into his arms, the crease of his pillowcase spelling out his exhaustion for everyone to see at school tomorrow._ _

__“Chenle?” Jisung asks, tentatively._ _

__A hum._ _

__“I can go now, if you want.”_ _

__There’s a shuffle on the other end, like Chenle had leaned up and forgotten about the tangle of blankets beneath him. “No it’s okay. I don’t mind.”_ _

__“You sure?”_ _

__“It’s kind of nice to hear your voice. Very soothing. Like the audiobooks my mom plays in the car.”_ _

__Jisung pauses, trying to come up with a response to that. “Oh,” he ends up saying._ _

__“Plus, I know you’ll sleep through all of your classes tomorrow and eventually have to beg me for my notes, which means I’ll have another favor to lord over you,” Chenle says. “It’ll make all the sleep that I’m losing right now worth it.”_ _

__“You’re the worst,” Jisung says, with no heat, and falls asleep to Chenle’s satisfied hum._ _

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__Somehow, the second semester of junior year is even worse than the first. He’s not sure why he’s surprised by this, since awful things tend to get exponentially more awful the longer that they drag on for (see: school, driver’s ed, Chenle’s 2000s pop playlists), but he still feels like he’s been blindsided as he stares down at his latest physics test._ _

__“I asked Renjun for his grade tracking spreadsheet,” Chenle says, leaning over to glance at him. “He said that if you scored 105% on every single test left in the year then your grade would round up to a B.”_ _

__“STEM classes don’t round,” Jisung reminds him._ _

__“I don’t think that that’s the part you should be worried about.”_ _

__“Yeah,” Jisung sighs. “I know.” They’re in his room trying to work through the assignments that have already started piling up ever since they got back from break. Chenle initially came over to return the dish that Jisung’s mom had gifted them kimchi with, and got suckered into staying after Jisung promised to watch Stephen Curry videos with him. Unfortunately, his mom caught on and switched off the wifi, so now they’ve resorted to actually doing their homework._ _

__“It’s okay. I’m just not going to go into anything that involves physics.”_ _

__Chenle squints at him. “You’re going to eliminate entire professions because you got a C in high school.”_ _

__Jisung shrugs. Pretty much._ _

__“Yeah, that’s valid.”_ _

__Chenle hums under his breath as he goes back to his worksheet, volume turned up so loudly that Jisung can hear the song through his headphones. There’s a feeling in his chest that he can’t quite name then, settling into the empty space with an almost natural kind of ease. He’s tempted to chalk it up to the fact that he just got back from Korea, but he knows that that isn’t entirely true._ _

__“Hey,” Chenle tugs one headphone out, using it to bat at Jisung’s arm. “You know what you want to do for your birthday?”_ _

__In the frenzy of calculating his GPA he’d almost forgotten that his birthday was coming up, to be honest. Jisung supposes that that’s some kind of metaphor for the public education system. What metaphor exactly? He doesn’t know. He’s not doing too great in English, either._ _

__“I’ll probably spend it with you again,” he says. “Doesn’t the Lunar New Year start on the same day?”_ _

__“Yeah, but don’t you want to do something special?”_ _

__Jisung snorts. “Like what?”_ _

__Chenle reaches over to shove him. “I don’t know, go out for ice cream after school?”_ _

__“It’s February.”_ _

__“So?”_ _

__Jisung raises one hand upward, pledge-of-allegiance style. “I promise I’m perfectly happy just spending my birthday with you.”_ _

__“Oh,” Chenle says, after a moment. There’s a smile tugging at the side of his mouth. “Okay, then.”_ _

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__He’s not sure why Chenle was worried anyway, because he gives Jisung the best gift he’s probably ever gotten in his entire life._ _

__“You drew something from the story I wrote?”_ _

__“Not me,” Chenle’s quick to clarify, pulling it out of his pocket. “That was all Renjun.”_ _

__“Still,” Jisung says, eyes glued to the shading and detail clearly present. “Thank you.”_ _

__Chenle scratches at the back of his neck, ears uncharacteristically red._ _

__Is this how Chenle had felt when Jisung gifted him that song? He’s not sure. He’s definitely going to frame this though, even if he can’t stand to read back the story that it came from anymore._ _

__The TV blares then, as if indignant at being ignored. Some catchy tune comes on and Chenle groans when he recognizes it. “My grandma works out to this,” he mutters under his breath, petulant. On the other side of the room their parents have cleared away the table to start playing poker, even though they’d all learnt with different rules. Jisung knows the two of them will get pulled into it eventually, but for now he lets himself enjoy the moment, the clock ticking down to midnight and Chenle curled up by his side, warm._ _

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__It’s not that Jisung’s never liked anyone before, or that he doesn’t know how these things go. Because he has—a brief fixation on Jaemin freshman year that dissolved once he opened his mouth and an abundance of speeches about true love from Renjun, respectively—but Chenle’s the first one that he’s been afraid of liking. There’s a certain kind of vulnerability that Jisung reserves for things like childhood fears and public speaking. He doesn’t want to add Chenle to that list._ _

__But liking Chenle makes his stomach fold into knots, his heart beat into overtime, his hands restless and clammy by his side. They’re juniors now, and seniors next year, but what about after that? Who’s to say that things won’t change? That Chenle, an ever-present constant in his life, won’t still be there?_ _

__It’s easier to just swallow the words down. He feels sick each time, but it’s a small price to pay._ _

__And so he doesn’t plan on doing anything about it, until Jaemin asks him on their way back from swim practice, “So? Do you have any plans for Valentine’s Day?”_ _

__“Um,” he stalls, foot kicking at the gravel of the parking lot. “Not really.”_ _

__“Really? Nothing at all? Jisung,” Jaemin sings, drawing out the sound. “I’m graduating this year. Are you really going to let me leave without seeing you do anything about your crush?”_ _

__“I’m fine with the things they are,” he mumbles._ _

__Because truthfully, he is—he’s been friends with Chenle for longer than he’s liked him (Or so he thinks. It’s hard to tell; distinction is tricky when you’ve known someone for nearly half your life), and he’s more than fine if things stay the same. Sometimes he thinks it’d be nice, if he could reach out to hold Chenle’s hand whenever he wanted to, or give him flowers after musical and have it actually mean something more, but he never lets himself dwell on those thoughts for too long._ _

__Jaemin stops in the middle of the street to squint at him, searching. Jisung stops with him too, even though part of him is worried about getting run over. It’s a valid concern, okay? Teen drivers suck. Just look at Chenle._ _

__Eventually Jaemin starts walking again, seemingly satisfied with what he’s found. “If you’re sure.”_ _

__“Well, I just—I just don’t really know what to do. I just know that I like him.”_ _

__“And sometimes that’s enough,” Jaemin says. “I know I tease a lot, but you don’t have to act on it if you don’t want to.”_ _

__Jisung sighs. “It just feels like I should. Right? In every movie and every TV show, the next step is always confessing. It’s like,” he fiddles with the straps of his backpack, “the natural progression of things. Or something like that.”_ _

__“Who’s to say that there even is one?” Jaemin responds, unusually serious. “If you don’t want to, then you don’t want to. It’s as simple as that.”_ _

__“Except I don’t even…” Jisung trails off, twisting with his hands. “Know if I don’t want to? I just don’t know anything.”_ _

__“Same,” Jaemin says, and Jisung would laugh if Jaemin didn’t sound so sympathetic._ _

__A car honks at them then, cutting the silence that falls and forcing them back onto the sidewalk. Jisung used to think that it was unfair, because he only walks in the middle of the read because Jaemin does it, and Jaemin only does it because this is the closest he can get to rebellion as a senior still waiting on college results, but Jisung’s since learned to take it in stride._ _

“Well,” Jaemin tilts his head to the side. “You don’t have to do anything _grand_ for Valentine’s Day. If you even want to do anything, that is.”

__“I don’t know,” Jisung repeats. It feels like that's all he’s been saying._ _

__Jaemin grins at him. “I have an idea.”_ _

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__It’s a good idea in theory. Would be good in reality too, if Chenle weren’t so intent on defying all of the simple expectations set out for him._ _

__“What happened?” Jaemin asks, when Jisung doesn't say anything._ _

__“I don’t want to talk about it,” he huffs, pressing further into his pillow._ _

__Silence, as Jaemin processes the fact that Jisung had called him and clearly wanted to talk about it even if he wasn’t saying so._ _

__“That bad?”_ _

__“I told him I liked you,” Jisung groans, and then adds, as an afterthought, “Sorry.”_ _

__“Hold on. You what?”_ _

__“Yeah,” Jisung mumbles._ _

__“You were just going to give him flowers.”_ _

__“Yeah.”_ _

__“Flowers, to show that you care for him. Both as a friend and as something more, potentially.”_ _

__"Yeah.”_ _

__“How did that go wrong?”_ _

__“Very easily,” Jisung snorts._ _

__Part of him wants to blame the whole thing on Jaemin, since it was his idea in the first place, but Jisung knows that that isn’t entirely fair. On Valentine’s Day he’d woken up, scraped together all the money he currently had on him, and bought flowers from the first club he saw selling them before he lost the nerve altogether._ _

__“Flowers?” He’d said, holding the bouquet out to Chenle. They were blush pink and dripping all over the floor, having been hastily tied together with a bow._ _

__Chenle stared at him for a moment like he couldn’t tell whether Jisung was joking or not. “Shouldn’t you be giving that to the person you like?”_ _

__They stood stock-still in the hallway, blocking traffic for Chenle to glare at the flowers accusingly and for Jisung to try and come up with an excuse that made sense._ _

__“Who is it, anyway?” Chenle asked when Jisung didn’t say anything._ _

___You,_ Jisung’s brain answered. He pushed that down and said, “It’s not important.”_ _

__“Yeah, it kinda is,” Chenle said impatiently. “Give me the name.”_ _

__Jisung felt like he was going to cry. “Cut it, Chenle.”_ _

__“C’mon, I’m your best friend. You’re, like, supposed to tell me this kind of stuff.”_ _

And, well, what was he supposed to say to that? Chenle has told him every single embarrassing celebrity crush that he had ever had and Jisung repaid him with the story of the girl he’d trailed after in elementary school for two years until she moved away over the summer. He couldn’t _not_ answer. 

__“Uh—Jae—Jaemin,” he mumbled. The moment he does a laugh track plays in his head, interspersed with boos. He panicked, okay? What else could he have done?_ _

__“Told him the truth,” Jaemin says over the phone, but he doesn’t sound that mad about it. More matter-of-fact than anything else. Like he recognizes the cards that he’s been dealt and is adjusting accordingly._ _

__“I don’t want to fight over something stupid.”_ _

__“Your feelings aren’t stupid.”_ _

__“They sure feel like it.”_ _

__Jaemin sighs. “Just give yourself some time, okay? You can always try again.”_ _

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__Jisung doesn’t know much, but he does know that Chenle smiles like the world’s at his feet and laughs like that’s to be expected. He hums under his breath in study hall because it helps him concentrate and always saves the last piece of gum for Jisung, and when he’d first gotten his permit he’d driven Jisung home from swim practice and then stayed over for dinner because Jisung’s mom had insisted. He’s always up until 2AM watching horror movies to figure out which ones Jisung might be able to handle even though Jisung usually falls asleep halfway through their movie nights anyways, and claims that he’ll find a movie that isn’t so boring one day. He gets overly invested in the romantic subplots of whatever they watch, thinks that public promposals are more cute than awkward, and has a running Spotify playlist of songs that he wants played at his wedding even if he would never admit it. He falls hard and fast and gives out pieces of his heart with reckless abandon, and Jisung knows that he’s got one of them but he doesn’t know the size._ _

__Jisung might not know much, but he does know that Chenle deserves more than he could ever give him. It’s not an easy feeling to stomach, but it does put him at ease, however slight. No pressure to confess if it’s a hopeless endeavor to begin with._ _

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__“Chenle thinks that I should take you to prom,” Jaemin says by way of greeting when they see each other next._ _

__Jisung wrinkles his nose. “Isn’t that still, like, a month away?”_ _

__Jaemin shrugs. “He’s prepared.”_ _

__“For the wrong thing,” Jisung grumbles. He’s starting to regret telling that white lie, because now Chenle is relentless about getting Jisung to do something about his “feelings.” As if he and Jisung are one and the same, and therefore any romantic endeavor that Jisung was involved in was his, too._ _

__“My own love life is dead,” he’d said the one time Jisung asked him about it, brushing him aside. “Let me have this.”_ _

___I am right here,_ Jisung wanted to say, but that would require telling the truth. So he clamps his mouth shut on the three words that threaten to spill out of his mouth even after he’d sworn himself off confessing, and lets Chenle ramble on._ _

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__Swim season is over, so Jisung distracts himself with track instead. He’s more of a distance runner than anything else and his spikes are too old to do him much good now, but he makes it work. It means that he gets to school early for their morning run and comes back home when it’s gotten too dark out to see anything beyond the field lights. It means that he sees Chenle in the hallways, at lunch, and during class, but never long enough for anything substantial._ _

__It’s a good thing, he tells himself. He can sort out his feelings, figure out what they mean, and then, hopefully, get rid of them._ _

__Because every time he sees Chenle it’s another reminder of how he really feels, like that one pop punk phase he had in middle school that Chenle never fails to bring up whenever he thinks Jisung should be humbled. Chenle is nicer to think about than that, but that’s exactly why Jisung needs to stop thinking about him, as soon as possible. There’s no point in doing so, he reminds himself._ _

__And yet his heart flutters all the same._ _

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__This time over spring break it’s Chenle’s turn to travel. His family’s going to road trip across the US to visit every single college his counselor had recommended him, just like every other junior out there._ _

__“It was my mom’s idea,” he’d said, grumbling as he packed. “I told her that I didn’t need to see a school to figure out if I liked it or not, but she insisted.”_ _

__“Maybe she’s just using this as a vacation,” Jisung suggests._ _

__Chenle gives him a look and tosses five pairs of socks into his suitcase. “I don’t think college visits are her idea of a vacation, Jisung.”_ _

__He shrugs. “You never know.”_ _

__What that means for him though, is that when Jaemin invites him to the party he’s hosting that Saturday, Jisung has no reason not to go._ _

__“Hi!” Jaemin had shouted at him over the music, face frighteningly red, and then turned away before Jisung got a chance to answer him._ _

__Well. That’s to be expected. Jisung makes his way into the kitchen, sidestepping a particularly rowdy game of beer pong along the way. The back door opens as someone comes in and almost instantly everything feels that much more muted, like the night air has sucked up all the sound in the place and is holding onto it for safekeeping, only to let it go as the door swings shut. The bass thumps through the speaker system, which is impressive considering that Jaemin had bought it off of eBay, and pulses through Jisung with each step that he takes._ _

__Things are slightly better in the kitchen namely because the light is on. The counter is littered with bottles of varying sizes and colors, with names that Jisung doesn’t even know how to pronounce, so he picks the most unassuming one he can find and pours himself a cup. He turns back toward the main room so that he can find some couch corner and watch everyone get progressively more drunk over the rim of his cup, but before he can get there someone grabs a hold of his elbow._ _

__“Walk with me for a bit?” Jeno asks, shirt collar askew and glasses conspicuously missing._ _

__Jisung follows Jeno as they make their way to the basement, trying not to trip on anything before they get there._ _

__“Pretty loud,” Jeno says, nodding to the door._ _

__Jisung hums and sips at his drink, not really knowing what else to do. He and Jeno have been in the same friend group ever since he started high school, and yet Jisung doesn’t think he’s ever been with Jeno alone before. Not because they don’t like each other, or anything. They just have other people that they’re closer with._ _

__Still, Jeno must know more about Jisung than he lets on, because he waits for Jisung to finish swallowing and then asks, “What’s up with you and Chenle?”_ _

__Jisung frowns. This isn’t what he’d expected when Jeno had dragged him down here. “Did Jaemin put you up to this?”_ _

__Jeno looks a little put out by that response. “No, Chenle told me.”_ _

__“He did?”_ _

__Jeno nods. “He said something about you liking Jaemin, actually?”_ _

__“Oh my god,” Jisung drags a hand down his face. “Don’t listen to him. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”_ _

__“He seemed sure.”_ _

__“He’s—he’s confused,” Jisung sighs. “I promise, you have nothing to be worried about.”_ _

__That startles a laugh out of Jeno. “Who said I was worried?”_ _

__“Fair enough.”_ _

__They lapse into silence then, not really sure where to go from there. Jaemin’s basement is usually reserved for his parents’ dinner parties, so Jisung feels more than a little out of place with his red Solo cup. Jeno seems to have no qualms about making himself right at home though, and part of Jisung wonders whether it’s because Jaemin’s home is that familiar to him, or if it’s Jaemin himself._ _

__“Why does he think you do, then?”_ _

__Jisung blinks. “Why does he think what?”_ _

__“That you like Jaemin.”_ _

__Jisung grimaces. “Because I told him I did.”_ _

__Jeno squints at him. “And do you?”_ _

__“No,” Jisung shakes his head. “God no. I just panicked—Chenle was asking me and I couldn’t tell him who I really like.”_ _

__“Because you like him.”_ _

__“Because I like him,” Jisung sighs._ _

__“Ever thought about telling him?”_ _

__Jisung snorts. “Only a couple hundred times.”_ _

__Jeno stares at him intently. “And why don’t you?”_ _

__“It’s—” Well, it’s a lot of things. It’s that Chenle probably doesn’t like him back, that Jisung doesn’t want to ruin what they have for some crush, that they’ve known each other for too long and grown too comfortable for things not to inevitably spiral downward if Jisung confesses. “It’s complicated,” he says._ _

__Jeno tilts his head to the side. He’s smiling, a subtle, slight thing, and suddenly Jisung’s reminded that Chenle confides in Jeno more often than he lets on._ _

__“I wouldn’t be so sure of that,” Jeno says, still smiling._ _

Jisung wants to ask him what exactly he means by that, because he can’t say something like that without knowing _more,_ but before he can the basement door bursts open and Jaemin hurls himself down it, taking the steps two at a time.

__“Someone threw up on the carpet,” he mutters, pushing past both of them to grab a stack of napkins from the hallway closet. “I knew we shouldn’t have played rock paper scissors to decide who hosted this time.”_ _

__Jeno reaches over to rest a hand on Jaemin’s shoulder, and Jisung watches as Jaemin visibly straightens under his touch._ _

_That could be you and Chenle,_ his brain whispers traitorously to him. _If you just—_

__He drowns himself out by downing the rest of his cup. Not. Happening._ _

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It isn’t until April that Jisung learns why they call it a _crush._

__Being in love makes you flighty and spaced out, both of which have light connotations (take that, AP Lit). And that's true most of the time. Being around Chenle makes him feel like he’s floating, feet never having found their way to the ground._ _

_Crush_ is a harder word. It feels heavier, somehow. There’s weight to it. _Crush_ sounds like there’s something pressing down on his chest, forcefully reminding him that there’s something he needs to do, something he needs to get rid of, and fast.

__But as it turns out, there’s no need for any of that. Jisung shouldn’t have worried so much about whether or not to confess because Chenle likes someone else._ _

He never tells Jisung so, but one day Jisung stumbles out of mock AP testing to find Renjun and Chenle folded up against the lockers together, Renjun’s head pressed against Chenle’s shoulder, and feels something hollow thud inside of his chest. A little bit like _well, of course. You should’ve known._

__And he wouldn’t have thought that much of it if it weren’t for the way that Chenle had looked at him afterward, face as blank as a sheet. Scared, almost. As if Jisung had interrupted something that he shouldn’t have._ _

__It’s an expression that crops up again and again whenever Chenle’s around Renjun. And Chenle starts spending more time with Renjun too—they go out for bubble tea after school, trade lunches even though Renjun’s stingy with his food, and share playlists with each other online. Everything just seems to add up._ _

__It makes sense this way, Jisung supposes. Renjun is smart and collected and already speaks Chinese, while Jisung is barely pulling B’s in most of his classes and can’t speak Spanish even after taking it for years on end. It’s not a competition by a long shot._ _

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__After track season finishes too, Jisung truly has no excuse to avoid Chenle. Though it’s not like he needs it—they get easily swept up by the rush of actual AP testing and all of the graduation parties that happen near the end of the school year, which are infinitely more exciting now that they actually know the seniors who are graduating._ _

__“You better call,” Jaemin demands, pulling Jisung in for a hug so tight that he can quite literally feel the air being choked out of him._ _

__“Actually, we text now,” he says, in an attempt to lighten the mood._ _

__Jaemin ignores that and squeezes him even tighter._ _

__Jisung makes desperate eye contact with Jeno, who smiles and does absolutely nothing when Jisung starts to lose consciousness right in front of him. What does Chenle even like about this guy?_ _

__Donghyuck goes for a hug too, but Jisung has learned his lesson now._ _

__“Nope,” he says, karate chopping Donghyuck’s arms before they can get too far. “Not happening.”_ _

__That only seems to encourage him even more, because he honest-to-god picks Jisung up and starts spinning him._ _

__“You’re the worst,” he mutters, face red while Jaemin squawks in the background about stealing and the importance of keeping one’s hands to themselves._ _

__When he finally gets set back down on the ground, he finds himself face to face with Renjun. “Congratulations on graduating,” he says after a moment. Things have been somewhat stilted between the two of them ever since that night. Not through any fault of Renjun’s own, because he’s nice and attractive and Jisung totally understands why Chenle would like him, even if he’s a little upset that Chenle hadn’t told him so. He can’t blame Renjun for any of that, so he nods and smiles accordingly as Renjun tells him to stay in touch, and all but collapses in the passenger seat of Chenle’s car as they drive back to his house._ _

__“I’m going to miss them,” Chenle says when they’re stopped at a red light. “Lunch next year will be really weird with just the two of us.”_ _

“Yeah,” Jisung says, even though he’s thinking _miss them? Or miss Renjun?_

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__Except, of course, like everything important in life, Jisung confesses when he least expects it._ _

__The start of summer is always surprisingly cool. They’re lying on the floor of Jisung’s room, wind filtering in from the window that he’d propped open with an old textbook. The sun casts a lazy glow over them both, curls over their legs and stretches toward the crown of Chenle’s head. His hair gleams gold, under all that light._ _

__“I don’t even get the memes,” he says, once they’ve finished checking their AP scores and have moved on to the more compelling reasons to take those tests. “Life is so unfair.”_ _

__“At least you have me,” Jisung answers, the words slipping out before he gets a chance to think them through._ _

__He watches as Chenle processes what he just said. Part of him nearly shrivels up on the spot. God, why did he say that?_ _

__“That’s terrible compensation,” Chenle says after a moment. “And I don’t even have you. You like Jaemin.”_ _

__Jisung is so sick of hearing this._ _

__“Okay, would you—I don’t like Jaemin, alright?” Jisung groans. “I don’t fucking like Jaemin anymore. I haven’t liked him since freshman year.”_ _

__The silence is absolutely deafening. Chenle’s mouth doesn’t drop open, per say, but it’s a near thing._ _

__“You liked Jaemin in freshman year?” He asks. “What the hell?”_ _

__“He was the first person I ever liked, and it was just because I thought he was really cool then, until I found out that he was a loser like the rest of us,” Jisung says. “I panicked when you asked me, alright?”_ _

__“So you lied?”_ _

“You were _interrogating_ me! What else was I supposed to do?”

Chenle doesn’t answer that, face screwed up in thought. “Then who _do_ you like? It’s not that big a deal, you know? We aren’t in elementary school anymore. Why are you so wound up over something like this?”

__Jisung is almost tempted to laugh. Why would he get wound up over something like this, indeed._ _

__“It’s a big deal to me,” he says instead._ _

__“You’re so lame.”_ _

__“Okay,” Jisung mutters. It stings more than he’d like to admit. “Then so I am.”_ _

__He’s about to leave it at that, because he’s managed to not only clarify that he doesn’t like Jaemin, but also get away with not telling Chenle who he actually likes, until he remembers that Chenle hasn’t been entirely truthful either._ _

__“Besides, you never told me you liked Renjun.”_ _

__Chenle wheezes at that, eventually dissolving into outright laughter. “Oh my god, no. Where did you get that idea?”_ _

__Jisung’s brain kicks into overdrive, trying to recalibrate everything that he’d seen over the past two months. Well, didn’t they—_ _

__“Is this about that night after AP testing?” Chenle asks. “Because I swear we were both just ridiculously tired. I would rather date a date than date Renjun.”_ _

__Jisung won’t admit it, but something light floats up inside of his chest at those words. “That’s a little mean to Renjun,” he says, but he can’t help laughing at the mental image anyway._ _

__“Uh, Renjun would probably say much worse things about me.”_ _

__Jisung hums. That’s probably true._ _

__“I thought I was better than this, but I guess not,” he says. “Too many sitcoms. Sorry, Chenle.”_ _

__Chenle waves him off with a hand. “No, you’re fine.”_ _

__“I mean, you’re my best friend.” Jisung’s heart clenches at the words, but he soldiers on anyway. “And I feel like I’ve been mean to you lately. So like that apology was like. Big. You know.”_ _

__“Nice,” Chenle says, grinning. “And you’re fine. I’m sorry too. Sorry for pushing you about who you liked and all that.”_ _

__“No, it’s just that, though, I…” Jisung takes a deep breath. He’s really doing this. “It was you, who I liked? But I was really confused and scared because we’re best friends, and I didn’t want to ruin that for anything. But like I promise I’d rather be your friend than anything else.”_ _

__There. He said it. It’s out there, and he can’t take it back._ _

__He holds his breath, waiting for Chenle to react._ _

__“Wait, what does that mean?” Chenle demands. “You can’t just drop that on me and—you liked me? Do you still like me?”_ _

__Wow, this is even worse than he’d thought it would be, and he’s thought of some pretty awful ways that this could go. His stomach feels like it’s being pulled apart by a conveyor belt, and the blood rushing past his ears feels almost tangible, in a way._ _

__“I mean, yeah,” he says, voice small as he huddles in on himself. “But like I said. It doesn’t matter. I’d rather be your friend than—”_ _

__“Stop, stop,” Chenle says, raising a hand to cut him off. “Just shut up for a moment. I like you too. We’re on the same wavelength here.”_ _

__Jisung blinks. “Oh,” he says, intelligently._ _

And then— _oh._ Wow. Chenle likes him back. He confessed and Chenle _likes him back._ He bites his lip, trying to keep his smile from breaking out onto the rest of his face, but he can’t help it. It spills through the gaps of his teeth and pulls at the top of his cheekbones, almost painful. 

__“So, what now?” He asks._ _

__Chenle shrugs, but he’s smiling too. “I don’t know. Your call.”_ _

__And Jisung’s glad, that he got the words out, and that it went well, even. He hadn’t expected that when he’d first realized that he liked Chenle. It feels so long ago—summer, last year, Chenle nearly upending his car and the two of them in it on the freeway. But even then, not much has changed._ _

__“I don’t want to date you, sorry,” he says. “It’s going to be senior year soon and a lot’s going to change. So I did mean it, when I said I wanted to be your friend.”_ _

__He squeezes his eyes shut as he waits for Chenle’s response. This is… well, new. For the both of them, sure, but for Jisung especially. He’d never let himself think this far ahead. He’s not really sure if he wants to do anything more, for right now._ _

__“Okay,” Chenle says, with an easy smile. “But you like me.”_ _

__Jisung feels himself go red. “Yes.”_ _

__“Then in time I’ll ask you out,” Chenle says. “And if you still feel the same way, then you should say yes.”_ _

__“Deal,” Jisung grins, the sunlight filtering through the curtains and making everything look more golden than it’s supposed to be. The sky is blue, they have the whole summer ahead of them, and the person that he likes likes him back._ _

__It can’t get any better than this._ _

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__Senior year is:_ _

__Waking up late in the mornings before realizing that they actually have some privileges now, and get to miss first period study hall in favor of sleeping in. Jisung kept forgetting the first month of school and called Chenle so many times that his phone bill nearly doubled that September._ _

__Carpooling to school together, now that Chenle's proven that he's a capable driver and won't crash into the next stop sign that they see. Jisung's still not convinced, but it's either death by Chenle's driving prowess (or lack thereof) or death by school bus fumes. He pretends it's a hard choice to make, but it isn't really, when Chenle pulls up each morning with a cup of coffee for them to split because neither of them can drink a full one by themselves._ _

__Spending the afternoons sitting next to each other in the library, Chenle sharing his headphones and humming under his breath even after the librarian tells him to quit it. He's started creating playlists by subject, so Jisung's come to associate Carly Rae Jepsen with English, Nicki Minaj with Calculus, and so on and so forth._ _

__Nearly collapsing under the weight of college applications, because junior year was hard but senior year is even harder. Jisung is too embarrassed to write about himself, so eventually Chenle gets fed up and writes his essay for him. "So you have an example to work from," he'd said, but instead Jisung secretly saved it onto his desktop to read whenever he felt like he wouldn't get in anywhere._ _

__Getting into different colleges that are farther from each other than either of them would've liked them to be. They'd kind of seen it coming, since Jisung wants to try and take his writing seriously, while Chenle cares more about where he was going to wind up, but it doesn't make it any easier to stomach._ _

__"I mean, that was to be expected, honestly," Chenle says, sprawled out on the floor of his room. "But if you forget me I'll kill you."_ _

__Jisung laughs. "I couldn't forget you even if I tried," he says, and this time there's no hesitation, no belated desire to take it back. It's true. All of it, down to every last word._ _

__They sit with that for a moment, matching grins on their faces._ _

__"So, long distance, huh? Is there anyone who isn't doing that nowadays?"_ _

__"Uh huh," Chenle hums, distracted by a fly buzzing near his ear._ _

__He looks at Chenle, really looks at him, and feels a rush flow through him. Not exactly courage, but something close enough. "Hey," he says, willing his voice not to shake. "Go out with me."_ _

__Chenle sits up and stares at him, half-pleased, half-offended. "I thought I was supposed to ask you out!"_ _

__"Sorry, got to it first," Jisung says. Chenle's still staring at him, and it's killing him more than he wants to admit. "So yes or no?"_ _

__"I mean, sure, I guess," Chenle huffs, petulant, but Jisung knows him better than that._ _

__He knows that fireworks are going off inside of Chenle's chest, just like they are in his own, and that eventually Chenle will lean over to press his smile against Jisung's own, and that it will taste so, so sweet._ _

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading; please let me know what you thought and/or come find me here! ⟶ [twitter](https://twitter.com/mythsick) / [cc](https://curiouscat.me/dedication)


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